When my husband and I were falling in love and committing ourselves to coupledom, I said to him, in all seriousness, “I want decades with you.” That was more than four years ago, when he was 55, and I was 53. It felt like a tall order; his mother died at 62, my father at 47. Then there was the fact that I’d had “a mild case of cancer,” undergoing surgery and radioactive iodine treatment for thyroid cancer. At the time of our courtship, however, I was in fine health, and so was John. (As of this writing we still are, knock wood.) This being the case, I am as hopeful for our future now as I was when we were betrothed. (Great word, isn’t it?) I’m reminded of Emily Dickinson’s great poetic line: “Hope is the thing with feathers.” My husband and I have been flying together for half a decade. I want to soar many more miles with him.

John turns 60 on Thursday, February 13. There’s something about crossing the threshold into a new decade that gives one pause; mid-lifers especially, I think, tend toward reflection here, especially if they’re in a second relationship. We have fewer mile markers in front of us, and we know that one of them will be fateful. All John or I can do is live each day with love—as if every day is Valentine’s Day, as, indeed, it will be the morning after his birthday.

Besides hosting Valentine’s Day, the 14th is a significant date for us because we met on the 14th of June. For that reason, when we decided to marry, we chose August 14 as our wedding day. The middle of February is, you might say, a peak time on our calendar, what with his birthday, V-Day, and, this year, our 56-month anniversary. But this doesn’t necessarily mean it’s black-tie-and-gown party time. Last year, for example, movers in Richmond were loading a truck with our belongings. This year, as I write this, I’m still in a leg cast.

As Connie Schultz says, life happens. John and I might not be able to go out and paint the town Cupid red, but by spreading out the significance of our love over 365 days—that is, by not taking one another for granted—each day feels more valuable, more treasured. Being mindful of our love each day helps us stack the deck. We might have only half a decade on our scorecard, but if we care for each other, are kind to each other, and express our love in ways minuscule as well as magnificent—every single day—it will seem as though we really are getting more decades than the calendar suggests. Some might call this magical thinking. I call it hoping, with feathers.

What do we talk about when we talk about love? I recently had the honor to participate, via Google Hangout, in a lively panel discussion on the WHOA! Network. I loved talking with these accomplished, thoughtful, and insanely fun women about what it really means to find love at 50-plus. We talked about the lessons of our past relationships. We talked about the exhilaration of discovering that one amazing person who is perfect for us—and our surprise in realizing that person happens not to possess some of the qualities and life experiences we’ve toted around on our preconceived checklist of “must-haves.” We talked about the courage it takes to make a commitment, to upend our lives in order to start a new one with THE ONE.

Lynn Forbes, a co-founder of WHOA!, moderated our chat, which features model and entrepreneur Cindy Joseph and writer Tammy Bleck. You can view the short clip above to eavesdrop on what we had to say, but you can also watch the full conversation right here:

This is not “Steve.” To find out who this is, please read the entire post.

Let’s call him Steve. After all, that’s what he called himself on Match.com. And who’s to say if that was his real name?

Steve and I have never met, but he’s the reason I decided to step off the Match.com bus, and for that I owe him my gratitude. Why? Because in the world of online-dating algorithms, where any click, keyword, or action is fraught with significance, stumbling across his profile, which he had the cheek to title “Thank You For Shopping at the Man Store,” ricocheted me onto a fateful course.

It was time for me to renew my six-month subscription on Match.com. Or was it? Steve’s headline was a wake-up call of sorts: If what I was doing was “shopping at the man store,” well, in the words of the immortal Bard: “Yuck.”

Four years of on-again, off-again attempts to meet someone in cyber-land had taken their toll. This was clearly a stupid way to meet people, and I was done. Finished.

That weekend I sent Match my notification that I’d not be renewing, and went about my business.

I had taken a few vacation days from work, and the next day, a Monday, was beautiful and bright outside. I was about to go out for a walk. But the siren call of the inbox lured me from my intended rounds.

I still had a couple of days before my Match profile vanished from public view. Now, with the pressure off, it might be fun to log onto my email and see what new horrors awaited me.

Well what do you know? With just a couple of days left to go on Match, I get a nibble.

I click the link that takes me to the Match website, and click again to see what Match has to say about him.

“He’s a 55-year-old man living in Cleveland, OH.”

Okay, age is fine. Geography, manageable.

“You both fancy felines. Like you, he’s not a smoker. He has a graduate degree.”

An intelligent cat-lover who doesn’t have nicotine stains on his teeth. This just keeps getting better and better.

I click on the link to his profile.

Ah. He’s included a picture. That’s always a good sign. There’s nothing creepier than seeing a faded blue head in silhouette accompanied by a wink (or, sometimes, a leer).

Wait. This is a nice picture. Look at those bright, clear blue eyes! And gosh darn it all, he’s got a dog, too! That is, if he didn’t rent the pup for the picture. (Had I grown cynical? Yes, just a little, around the edges.)

I was aware of the cyber-clock ticking. In a couple of days, I’d be lost to ArtsandSportsLvr forever. I had a decision to make. I could let boy-and-his-dog into my life, or let them trot off into the sunset. And live out the rest of my days with my cats.

Hello, and thank you for your interest.
I must say that from what I read in your profile, we seem to have much in common. You also have a great smile; it suggests a good, kind soul.

My subscription to Match ends this week, and I’m not renewing it. If you would like to get to know me off-line, as it were, and wish to send me a note, here’s my e-mail address in the real world:

[excised]

Have a wonderful day!

—Marci

I go out for my walk, and when I return, there’s a message waiting for me:

Marci, thanks for sharing your e-mail address. I would like to continue chatting until you get comfortable enough to plan a get-to-know-you meeting. I was introduced to the Oberlin concerts at the gazebo last year and enjoyed two of them. The theater there is a wonderful bargain as well. I have been told that the art museum is worth the trip and is on my list of to-do’s this summer.

Now you have my e-mail address and feel free to use it.

John

“Go out and make a difference in the world and it will make a world of difference in you.” – JR

I’m intrigued. A guy who includes a quote from himself in his email signature. That could seem pretentious, but this doesn’t strike me that way. I like the philosophy here. Could this be a man who’s not full of himself? An actual nice guy?

After a few more emails, we agree to speak on the phone.

I like his voice.

We set up a meeting at the museum in the town where I live.

That date, our first, lasts seven hours.

Reader, I married him.

I know I had become cynical about online dating toward the end of my tenure, but with success and the passage of time, it’s clear to me that I really had to give the algorithms time to do their work. John and I would never have met without the nudge from our cyber Dolly Gallagher Levi.

I wrote about this experience, and the online dating phenomenon, for the Richmond Times-Dispatch in an article published September 4, 2011. My research included interviews with Amy Canaday of Match.com’s public relations office, and two experts— Mark Brooks, an online dating consultant, and Dr. Robert Epstein, a contributor to Scientific American Mind.

When I interviewed Canaday by email in 2011, she told me that in the previous five years, the fastest-growing demographic for Match.com was the 50-and-older age group.

Unattached boomers? Are you listening?

Readers, this post is part of a GenFab Blog Hop. To begin reading all of the posts on the subject of “How I Met My Significant Other,” please click here.

What a week this has been! You might recall that on Monday, I posted an essay called “To Marci, On Your 20th Birthday,” which I wrote as part of a “blog hop” sponsored by Generation Fabulous, an amazing Facebook group to which I’m honored to belong. (We lovingly call it GenFab.) If you haven’t had a chance to read that post yet, please do, and please check out the posts by my GenFab compatriots. There’s a lot of collected wisdom there, and it seems that the Huffington Post agrees. Three Huffington Post sections—HuffPost Women, HuffPost50, and HuffPost Healthy Living—as well as HuffPostLiving’s Facebook page, featured 14 of us in an article about our blog hop. (You can find my quote on the second panel of the Huffington Post slideshow.)

The question—”What Advice Would You Give Your 20-Year-old Self?”—is really striking a chord with readers: people all over are sharing and commenting. I’d love to give readers of “The Midlife Second Wife” a chance to weigh in on the topic. So tell me:

NOTE: KatieCouric.com published an edited version of this post as “Learning to Love Again” on Monday, Oct. 22, 2012.

As many magazine articles, advice columnists, and situation comedies will tell you, it’s tricky being the first person in a relationship to say, “I love you.” Remember George Costanza? George was left holding what Jerry Seinfeld called a “pretty big matzo ball” because he failed to receive the much coveted “I love you return.” But what’s funny on television is actually quite terrifying in real life. It takes a huge leap of faith and nerves of titanium to say the “L” word first.

Take that terror to the tenth power if you’re divorced.

I know whereof I speak. After 26 years of marriage, my first husband and I divorced. Fast-forward six years, and I meet him. You know, The One. But let’s digress a moment, because playing with these numbers has given me an epiphany.

When I met The One, I was one year shy of my seven-year cellular renewal cycle—you know, that “Aha! Moment” your body supposedly has when all of its cells slough away, leaving you with an almost brand-new self. In truth, as Nicholas Wade wrote in a New York Times science articleseven years ago, some cells—“the neurons of the cerebral cortex, the inner lens cells of the eye and perhaps the muscle cells of the heart”— remain unchanged. Now that’s what I call something of great constancy. The cellular structures of the brain, the eye, and the heart—three essential components in registering romantic love, if you ask me—remain constant. The cells in the rest of our bodies hit the refresh key, as it were.

Interesting. But the brain, eye, and heart theory didn’t pass the constancy test in my first marriage, I’m sad to say.

Then again, you never know. I like the idea of considering, given multiples of seven, that perhaps anything is possible. Believe me, I have mapped this out. I was married at 21 and divorced at 47. (Okay, so I’m a year or two off.) But everything did seem possible when I met The One, skipping along as I was toward my next seven-year cycle of renewal. The One and I had a lot in common: we made each other laugh, we sang lyrics from the Great American Songbook while cleaning up the kitchen after cooking together, and the attraction we felt toward one another left us in awe.

And then, two-and-a-half months into the relationship, it happened.

I did it. I’m the one who said it. After a hesitant sigh, he replied, as gently as he could, “I’m sorry. I’m just not there yet.”

Talk about your matzo balls. I could have opened a deli.

“Forget it,” I countered hastily. “I shouldn’t have said it. I understand what you’re saying/feeling/thinking.” (I was trying to fill in as many blanks as I could to cover myself.) “It’s all right.”

I wanted to believe that his reaction stemmed from emotional baggage. Our arms were filled with it. His divorce, however, was more recent than mine. I had reached the point where my baggage, as Dr. Terri Orbuch (The Love Doctor) says, could fit in the overhead compartment. Him? Not so much. He needed a skycap.

Or maybe it was something else. Maybe (Heaven forefend!) it was a case of “he’s just not that into you.”

And so he left, leaving me to wonder if I’d blown it. How could I have misread the signals? Everything pointed to love. All of the signs were there: the caring, the fondness, the intimacy, the long, meaningful conversations, the seeming trust, the genuine enjoyment in just being together. If that’s not love, what is?

I decided I wasn’t going to let this get to me. I was happy, he was happy. (He was, wasn’t he?) We had a date for the following evening; in fact, we had several events lined up into the next month. I wasn’t about to bring it up again.

Until one day I did.

“I blank you.”

“What?”

“I said ‘I blank you.’”

“What does that mean?”

“It can mean whatever you’d like it to mean. Fill in the blank. For my part, I know what it means but I’m not telling you. More cake?”

He laughed, and that was that. We were back on an even keel. “I blank you” became a running joke between us. He even started saying it to me.

The weeks flew by. Before I knew it, October was here, the month containing the second most dreaded Hallmark holiday (after Valentine’s Day) for single people: Sweetest Day.

I remember the scene as though it were yesterday. I had cooked dinner, something from my collection of Barefoot Contessa cookbooks. I bought him a maroon hooded Oberlin sweatshirt, not because he went to Oberlin, but because I did. I still lived in that quaint college town, and he loved its cultural vibe as much as I did. I wrapped the gift and bought a card. I presented both to him with a flourish. Here’s the card:

Four years after that first sweetest day together, we’re still celebrating. We’ve been married for two years. At the risk of tempting fate, by our seventh wedding anniversary, I fully expect the constancy theory to hold—my heart, my head, and my eyes will see what I’m seeing right now: He’s The One.

Marci, aka The Midlife Second Wife, with John on their wedding day. Photo credit: Roger Mastroianni

Where does the time go? It seems only yesterday when I received an “interest” notification via Match.com from “arts&sportslvr,” and here we are, about to celebrate our second wedding anniversary. (Those keeping careful notes will want to know, for the record, that our nuptials took place on August 14, 2010.)

So much has happened in two short, swift years. We moved to another part of the country and set down roots by buying a home. (I also started this blog, which celebrates its first anniversary later this month.) We continue to grow together and learn together and hold each other close when buffeted by life’s vicissitudes. We embrace one another’s neuroses. (Thank you, Wendy Swallow.) We celebrate every triumph, no matter how small. We listen to each other. We support one another. We are a duo, a couple, a unit, a team. We are each other’s best friend.

Do you see the flames in the separate candles we are holding? We are about to create one unified, eternal flame. It still burns strong and bright, despite a few clouds, despite some wind and rain. When we decided to get married, we knew there would be challenges to face—how could there not be? We were each of us starting over, from scratch, midway through our lives. The light at the end of the tunnel seemed so dim, so seemingly light-years away, that we simply had to trust that it was there. It is there. It flickers, sometimes brightly, sometimes with just a pale fire. It is, in the words of our wedding poem (Wendell Berry’s “The Country of Marriage”):

a pattern
made in the light for the light to return to.
The forest is mostly dark, its ways
to be made anew day after day, the dark
richer than the light and more blessed,
provided we stay brave
enough to keep on going in.

We are nothing if not brave. What else can we be? We are human and we live in this world and we have faith. And we are together, thank God.

On what will be our second wedding anniversary—and on every day of our lives together—I say to “arts&sportslvr:” Thank you for joining your candle to mine, and mine to yours.

Early readers of The Midlife Second Wife will remember this post about my mother, but since writing it last November, a few things have happened in its brief existence that justify a return engagement. The post, originally titled “A Tale of Two Deaths: Losing my Mother to Alzheimer’s,” received a “Voice of the Year” award at BlogHer’s recent conference in New York City. Out of some 1,700 entries, BlogHer selected only 110. This is quite an honor for me and I’m humbled by the recognition, since there’s such a huge talent stream flowing through BlogHer’s Women’s Publishing Network. I’m also proud to announce that the post will appear in an e-book anthology being published by BlogHer and Open Road Integrated Media. You might be familiar with Eileen Goudge’s novel The Replacement Wife. Open Road is her publisher. I’d say we VOTY winners are in extremely good company.

I don’t believe that a publication date for the e-book has been decided yet, but as soon as the publishers make that determination I’ll announce the news here and let you know how you can purchase a copy.

Now that my mother’s story is going to have a life beyond the blog, I’ve retitled it. I am also preparing myself mentally and physically for the daunting task of completing her story—possibly for a future book. This post was originally intended to be the first installment in a series—and you’ll be able to read future installments just as soon as I can get them written—but now I’m rethinking the whole writing project. It’s quite possible I’ll end up with a book. We’ll see.

Here then, is my proposed first chapter of Have You Met My Daughter? My Mother, Her Alzheimer’s, and Me.

Have You Met My Daughter? My Mother’ Her Alzheimer’s, and Me

A person with dementia (or Alzheimer’s Disease) suffers two deaths. The first death occurs when you discover the illness taking hold, erasing the vivacious mind and the vital spirit of the person you once knew. The second death is when the physical body expires. For these reasons, a bereaved person who loses a loved one—first to dementia, later to death—grieves twice. And although much has been written about mid-lifer’s—the so-called “Sandwich generation”—caught between caring for ill or elderly parents while still raising children, perhaps there is room in the literature for one more account. In November 2011, to mark National Alzheimer’s Disease Awareness Month and National Family Caregivers’ Month—and in honor of my mother, whose name was Angela—I began to write a series of essays about how I loved her and how I lost her. Not once, but twice.

“Have you met my daughter?”

This was the question my Mom, who had impeccable manners, regularly posed to co-workers or acquaintances when introducing me to them for the first time.

“Have you met my daughter?”

This was the question my Mom regularly posed to the women seated withher at a table in the secured-wing of the assisted-living facility where I regularly visited her. Without fail, each time I entered the room, she would ask these same women:

“Have you met my daughter?”

There was, of course, tremendous solace in the fact that despite her illness, Mom did recognize me as her daughter. Nevertheless, it was heartbreaking to see how her memory, her very sense of self, had deteriorated. The signs had been there for a while; it just took time for me to connect the dots.

Mom had always been what used to be called “high-strung.” She suffered from panic attacks, and was fearful of many things, including learning how to drive after my father died.

She had also always been something of a pack rat. Today there is a name for this: compulsive hoarding. But at the time when I was grappling with this issue in terms of my own mother, I did not know it was an illness for which there might be a treatment; I simply put it down to another of her eccentricities. I would clear out as much of the clutter as she would permit (there remained piles that I was forbidden to touch), and a week or so later, my efforts were obliterated. It was not at all unlike Sisyphus pushing his boulder up the mountain.

After several years of this, the hoarding had gotten so out of control that I began to fear for her safety. I was finally able to convince her that she needed help, and she allowed me to hire a cleaning woman to do her laundry, dust, vacuum the floor, and keep the bathroom and kitchen clean.

It was ultimately the cleaning woman—or, more to the point, the existence of the cleaning woman—which brought home to me the awful realization that something was far more seriously wrong with Mom than eccentric hoarding.

She and the cleaning woman didn’t hit it off, largely because Mom did not like anyone else touching her things. The woman, goodhearted and a good worker, called me to complain about what she could see was a losing battle. I was struggling over how to handle the situation when it resolved itself. Mom called me late one night in a real panic; I needed to come over at once. There was a terrible problem.

When I arrived, she pointed to a hole in the dining-room window screen—no larger than two inches in diameter.

“That woman you hired is stealing from me,” Mom said in a tremulous voice tinged with outrage. “Do you see that? That’s how she’s getting in. She’s sneaking in, crawling in through that hole.”

To be continued …

NOTE: The Alzheimer’s Association is not responsible for information or advice provided by others, including information on websites that link to Association sites and on third-party sites to which the Association links. Please direct any questions to weblink@alz.org.

Last year, on 1/1/11, the very first baby boomers turned 65; the world welcomes the second wave this year. Happy Birthday, Boomers! If you’re keeping count, between 2011 and 2029, all baby boomers—the cohort born between 1946 and 1964—will have reached the age of 65. In seasons past, that was the age that marked the traditional start of retirement. But it’s a new dawn, a new day, and as Bob Dylan wrote, the times they are a-changin’.

Have you changed with them? If so, and one of your resolutions for the New Year is to save money for your retirement, congratulations! If not, and you are a boomer, then all you have is company to go with your misery, and a future that could be blowin’ in the wind.

Image by 401K via Flickr

Michelle Mast is a professional CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER™ with AXA Advisors, LLC. She says that in 2011, 60 percent of baby boomers saved less than $100,000 toward their retirement1. Mast received a Certificate in Retirement Planning from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania for completing the AXA Equitable at Retirement program. But you don’t need a certificate from Wharton to know that this statistic does not paint a pretty picture. Mast recalls that the rule of thumb used for projecting a person’s retirement plan once called for them to set aside 75 percent of what it cost to live in the manner to which they are accustomed. (We’ll talk in a moment about that.) Today, she says three factors have conspired to drive that projection from 75 percent up to 100 percent: mortality (people are living longer), inflation (‘nuff said), and health care expenses (ditto).

This is enough to send a person diving underneath the sofa cushions—if not to look for loose change, then to hide from the wolf at the door.

I recently spoke with Mast about strategies that might help those who haven’t saved enough for retirement.

TMSW: Michelle, the statistic about the number of boomers who don’t seem ready for retirement is pretty sobering.

MM: I know. And that’s the upside. Research also shows that during the same year, 36 percent of boomers saved less than $25,000 towards retirement, and 29 percent saved less than $10,0002.

What accounts for these low numbers?

There just aren’t as many pension plans today as there were in our parents’ generation. And market volatility may also be playing a role in many cases. But studies show that 14% percent of individuals have no retirement vehicle at all—not even an IRA account3.

This suggests to me that the retirement my generation envisioned may not be the norm.

That’s right. There may be what some people consider to be a “new normal.” A good number of people will be working during their retirement. This is significant: 50 percent of current retirees are finding that their actual retirement spending is equal to or higher than their spending prior to retirement4. Now in some cases, this is because people are doing things they weren’t able to do while they were working—traveling, for example. But people are generally living longer—into their 70s, 80s, and even 90s—especially women. Women have many financial concerns and are an extremely important part of what I’m saying now.

Well, what can be done to turn the tide?

People really just have to focus on savings; there is no such thing as a “retirement loan!” The only way to create the money for retirement is to save the money for retirement. Going backwards, analyze your current cash flow. Are there expenses you don’t have to incur? Can you set aside $10 a month? If so, put this toward an emergency reserve or a retirement account.

Really? Will $10 a month make a difference? I mean, I sometimes think that my nickel-and dime-approach to savings is like rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic; at the end of each month, I take whatever is left in my wallet, add it to the change I’ve dumped in my little tin can, and put it in a savings account.

There’s no silly way to save. What is important is saving.

Can you talk a bit about that “emergency reserve”? We’ve all been taught how important it is to save for a rainy day. How much should a person plan on setting aside for the deluge?

In the past, the rule of thumb was to have six months of your living expenses in an emergency reserve; that is, in a savings vehicle that’s liquid, where you can access the funds easily if you need to. But in light of all the volatility of the past four years, the conventional wisdom now is that your emergency reserve should be closer to a year’s worth of living expenses. So if you have $3,000 in expenses each month—mortgage, utilities, groceries, etc.—you should have almost $36,000 in your emergency reserve.

I’m going to need more dimes and quarters…You mention a vehicle that’s liquid. You mean like a savings account?

The formula is going to be different for everybody, but yes, a savings account, but also other places where you could house a portion of this money, for example: a money-market deposit account or a certificate of deposit. The idea is to have the money work as hard for you as it can while still maintaining liquidity.

Going back to my measly little $10 a month, if I want to use it to begin saving toward retirement, which investment strategy makes the most sense?

IRAs, or Individual Retirement Accounts, are savings vehicles you can consider for retirement, depending on your particular situation. There are two different kinds of IRAs—a Traditional IRA and a Roth IRA. Here are the key differences:

A Traditional IRA will give you a tax deduction at the time you make a contribution. The money will grow, tax-deferred, but when you take it out during retirement, it will be considered taxable income. One thing to bear in mind with a Traditional IRA is that when you reach the age of 70-and-a-half, you have to distribute the Required Minimum Distribution.

A Roth IRA is different in that respect; you actually don’t ever have to take money out of it, which makes it a nice legacy to pass on. But if you do take out a withdrawal, the good news is that the money you take out is not taxable income, because Roth IRAs are funded with after-tax dollars. There are, however, no tax deductions for the money you contribute to a Roth IRA; nevertheless, that money will grow tax-deferred, just like the Traditional IRA. This is important to bear in mind: studies have shown that any tax-free benefits during retirement are generally good features. In fact, increasingly 401(k)s are including a Roth feature. Keep in mind that your choice of retirement planning strategies should be based entirely on your individual needs, goals, risk tolerance, and particular situation.

You can also combine distributions when you reach 70; take some funds out of each type of IRA account to minimize your taxable cost.

I’ve heard the term “dollar cost averaging,” but I’m not sure I understand what it means. Can you shed some light on the subject?

Market volatility might cause investors to shift their investment strategy away from equities (stocks). But history suggests that a down market may be a good time to consider investing—and dollar cost averaging (or systematic investing) can be effective because it essentially provides the opportunity to purchase more shares less expensively. With dollar cost averaging, the amount you invest on a regular basis is always the same, meaning that you buy more shares when the price is low and fewer shares when the price is high. This spreads out your cost basis over several years, which helps provide insulation against short-term changes in market price; a lower average cost can ultimately equal a higher return when the market goes back up. First, you’d decide exactly how much money you feel comfortable investing each month, but be sure that you’re financially capable of keeping that amount consistent. You’d next select a long-term investment in which you would like to invest your money. Then, at regular intervals (weekly, monthly, or quarterly), you would invest that money into the investment you’ve chosen. Of course, generally speaking, all investments in equities are subject to fluctuation in value and market risk, including loss of principal—and it’s very important to understand that while dollar cost averaging has the potential to reduce the average cost of a share of stock, it does not guarantee a profit or protect against loss in declining markets. To be effective, there must be a continuous investment regardless of price fluctuations, and you must consider your financial ability to continue making purchases through periods of low price levels.

Some people might be fearful of meeting with a financial professional because they think they cannot afford it. Does a person pay a fee, the way one would pay a doctor or a lawyer, to obtain financial advice?

I experience this question often. Generally speaking, there are three ways that financial professionals get paid: fee-based, commission based, or a combination of both. All are fine; it just depends on the client’s objective and needs. For example, if a person only wants financial advice and doesn’t necessarily want to purchase investments, then he or she would consider a fee-based adviser.

At the end of the day, you want a financial professional who will be unbiased. I’m not going to recommend one account or fund or investment institution over another because of how it might affect my commission. I’ll suggest an account or a provider to you because I believe it’s the best for you.

Michelle, thank you so much for taking time away from your busy schedule to speak with me about these important money matters.

Michelle Mast is a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER™ professional and holds the Chartered Life Underwriter designation. She has been associated with AXA Advisors for more than 24 years. She works with individuals as well as corporations on both a personal and corporate basis in developing and implementing financial strategies to help them work toward their financial objectives and goals. Mast works in individual financial planning, retirement planning, risk management, college education funding, and strategies for estate planning. She has received the title of Qualified Plan Specialist based on her successful completion of an internal AXA Advisors training program and a written assessment, as well as the title of Retirement Planning Specialist by AXA Advisors, based upon the successful receipt of a Certificate in Retirement Planning from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania for completing the AXA Equitable at Retirement program. Previous work experience includes positions in the accounting and banking field. During her tenure with AXA Advisors she has received numerous awards, including being named to the company’s Hall of Fame and being named a Centurion Leader, and earning the National Growth award and Hallmark honors. Mast was one of 30 select women to participate in the AXA Women’s Council to further women in financial planning and management. She also focuses on assisting women in financial planning and works to incorporate women’s financial concerns with regard to divorce and widowhood. She conducts workshops on financial matters. Mast is a member of the Financial Planning Association and has earned a Bachelor of Science Degree in Accounting from New York University and a Master of Business Administration degree in Finance from Hofstra University.

Michelle Mast CFP®, CLU, offer securities through AXA Advisors, LLC (NY, NY 212-314-4600) member FINRA, SIPC. Investment advisory services are offered through AXA Advisors, LLC, an investment advisor registered with the SEC. Annuity and insurance products offered through AXA Network, LLC. Individual Financial Professionals may transact business and/or respond to inquiries only in states(s) in which they are properly registered and/or licensed. AXA Advisors, AXA Network, and AXA Equitable Life Insurance Company (NY, NY) are affiliated companies and do not provide tax or legal advice. Be sure to consult your own tax and legal advisors regarding your particular circumstances.

Someone very wise once told me: “If you want to make an omelet, you have to break some eggs.” Two years ago today, my husband John proposed marriage while we were enjoying a breakfast of omelets at one of our favorite haunts in Oberlin, Ohio—the Black River Café. We had been dating for a little more than seven months. We were each in our 50s. We were about to break a whole lot of eggs.

Nothing worth having in life is without sacrifice, which is what my sage friend was getting at. John was most definitely worth having. There were, however, a few built-in challenges. At the time of John’s proposal, he had been out of work for a year and in the midst of a nationwide job search. The chances were slim-to-zero that he would find a position in his field that would keep him—I mean us, for we were becoming an us—in Northeast Ohio. I was quite aware that by accepting his proposal, life as I knew it could change seismically. The metaphor represented by our breakfast was not lost on me.

I’ve written about this subject before, in an essay for the Richmond Times-Dispatch, so I’ll try not to go over old ground. What strikes me about this lovely little anniversary we’re marking today is not so much the eggs that we broke (for that you can read the essay), but the omelet we’ve made and continue to make.

Tom Hanks’ character Forrest Gump famously said: “Life is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you’re gonna get.” With all due respect, I think that somewhat misses the mark; it suggests that you just sit back and let life come at you, like a barrage of chocolate-covered confections. Sure, you make a selection from the sampler, but it’s already there for you, prepared and preconceived. Or, if you like, preordained.

For my money, life is more like an omelet. You have to break something (or break with something)—a routine, a way of life, the place you’ve lived—to create anew. You can fill it with whatever you like, and it sustains you. But the key difference is this: you are an active participant in its making, rather than a passive recipient in the taking.

So what is this omelet that John and I are making, anyway? It derives, as I said at the outset, from a whole lot of broken eggs: a move to a different part of the country, a new job for him, a new career path for me, a separation for both of us from our children.

This omelet/life of ours is spartan because of where we’re starting from—we won’t get fat off of it.

A year-long layoff brings with it debt; an inability to find work in a new city means a career change and a sporadic income. We’re building this new life with an eye toward nutrition rather than frills. What do we need? What are the essentials? What can we postpone or get by without? We allowed ourselves a wedding, to mark the life-moment for us and for our children so we would all have a real, glorious memory—but we have postponed a honeymoon. We rented for almost the first year of our marriage, then bought a house that we could afford, not one that would have given us more space. We curtail what we spend on entertainment, on clothing, and on anything that doesn’t contribute to getting us back on solid financial ground.

No, we’re not getting fat from this omelet. But from these limitations comes a real awareness of what is most important in life: our love, our life together, our health and our happiness. This life, now, with its challenges and limitations, is delicious.

Remarriage at life’s midpoint brings with it an awareness of something else: ephemerality. I should add then that our omelet/life is notable for its shelf-life. We know we won’t live long enough to celebrate a 50th wedding anniversary. If we make it to our 80s, we could swing a silver anniversary. But no one knows this better than we do: You can get married in your 20s and 30s and have no guarantee of a golden wedding anniversary. So the bottom line is this: we don’t know how many years we get together. None of us do.

And this is why John and I celebrate these sweet little milestones in our life together.

One of the best quotes I’ve come across in a long time—in two diverse venues—is from the writer Maria Robinson, who said: “Nobody can go back and start a new beginning, but anyone can start today and make a new ending.”

This seems an appropriate way to start the first blog post of the new year, don’t you think?

Robinson’s quote also gave me pause. I had always thought that my remarriage represented a New Beginning, but perhaps that way of thinking has me coming down too hard on myself. At life’s midpoint, it does seem daunting, if not downright exhausting, to Start Over. Maybe it’s just useful semantics (my cockamamie tendency to be unusually susceptible to language), but when I begin to recalibrate my perspective as that of making a new ending rather than a new beginning, I do believe I can actually feel some of the pressure roll off my back.

Ah, the hopefulness of a new year.

While we’re on the subject of new endings, I want to share with you some more wonderful insights that fought their way to the surface of all the tinsel and glitter of the season. They’re from a terrific article, “30 Things to Stop Doing to Yourself,” and I want to give a shout out to the blog Marc and Angel Hack Life for being awesome. Here’s the top 10 from their list of 30. As resolutions go, these are pretty extraordinary.

Stop spending time with the wrong people.

Stop running from your problems.

Stop lying to yourself.

Stop putting your own needs on the back burner.

Stop trying to be someone you’re not.

Stop trying to hold onto the past.

Stop being scared to make a mistake.

Stop berating yourself for old mistakes.

Stop trying to buy happiness.

Stop exclusively looking to others for happiness.

There are 20 more of these, and many other articles on their blog that will make you stop and think. But before you go, and while I’ve got you thinking about new endings and old behaviors to stop, would you like to share one of your own resolutions in the comment section? What’s the one thing you’d like to stop doing this year? Or better yet, what’s the one ending you’d like to make new?